spective. The city attracted people from di erent parts of the country and abroad, mostly representing the impoverished world. Residential con- ditions for Belgraders di ered great- ly. There were residential palaces that dominated the city centre, villas in newly formed cottages and colo- nies, as well as more modest build- ings and family houses. The most nu- merous were small houses and poor, unhealthy apartments for rent scat- tered all over the city. The beauti cation and construc- tion of the city, particularly its centre, were among the priorities of the city authorities. An international urban con- test was conducted and a General Plan for 1923-1924 was developed. The con- struction of the water supply and sew- age networks continued, while public lighting and transport, regular streets, landscaped parks and city squares were introduced. Constructed then were pub-
Novi Beograd gledan sa Kalemegdana, Fotografija Branka Turina iz 1965. New Belgrade as viewed from Kalemegdan, photography by Branko Turin from 1965 Izgradnja Pančevačkog mosta, oko 1933. Construction of Pančevo Bridge, circa 1933
lic buildings, ministries, banks, insurance companies, department stores, hotels, hospitals and schools. Two bridges were erected, one over the Sava, the other over the Danube. Although the Bel- grade of the interwar years has been described as one of the liveliest urban centres in this part of Europe, the fact is that it was lled with numerous contrasts and opposites. Belgrade was devastated several times during World War II. Among the damaged structures were public and residential buildings, urban infrastructure developments and industrial en- terprises. It was in 1947 that the National Committee of the City of Belgrade, then a new body of the city authorities, adopted the Five-Year Development Plan of Belgrade, with which the de- velopment of Belgrade was directed towards it being the coun- try’s capital city and its political, economic, cultural and admin-
istrative centre. It was necessary to develop the economy, improve the scant and unhygienic housing fund, as well as the network of health centres and social institutions, but also to increase the number of institutions of culture and education. As early as 1950, the General Urban Plan was adopted, with the construction and ex- pansion of the city then continuing in accordance with it. Over the following two decades, numerous areas of the city were ar- ranged, completely new settlements were constructed and build- ings and complexes were erected that today represent symbols of Belgrade. An important element in the development of the city was the formation of New Belgrade, which was conceived as the administrative and political centre of the socialist Yugo- slavia, and thus represented a major undertaking in every sense. Upon becoming the capital of the newly formed Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, it was during the interwar peri- od that Belgrade underwent the urban trans-
formation and modernisation that has largely de ned its identity. Many archi- tects, employed both in state institutions and the private sector, gave their own contributions to the construction of Bel- grade. Many of them have been written about to date by historiographers in an array of works and monographs. How- ever, very little is known about a certain number of builders who contributed in di erent ways to the construction of Bel- grade. Their lives and architectural crea- tivity have not been the subject of more extensive research to date. Many of them remained completely unknown until re- cently. This presentation is thus dedicat- ed speci cally to some of the unjustly for- gotten protagonists of the architectural scene of the interwar period, such as Fran- jo Urban, Katarina Marković-Šajinović and Alfred Melamed, but also others who in- uenced the architectural development of Belgrade in their own way.
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